How To: Remove Notification Area Icons In Windows 7

I know many of you don’t like the idea of removing the Sound and Network icons from the Notification Area or system tray but there are many users who prefer to keep the taskbar clutter free. If you fall in the second category, then good thing is that you can easily remove both the icons from the system tray in Windows 7 easily.

In Windows 7, users who have installed tens of programs with system tray icons keep the system tray clutter free without using third party tools. Microsoft has introduced a new handy feature to keep the notification area or system tray tidy and clutter free in Windows 7. Unlike its predecessors, Windows 7 lets you move one or more system tray icons. One can hide an icon by simply dragging the icon from its current position on the taskbar to towards the desktop area. And to view hidden icons, you can click the up arrow that you see on right of the taskbar.

In fact, you can remove any system tray icon like Action Center or any other program icons. If you don’t want to use the above mentioned drag and drop method, uou can hide all those icons in the Start menu properties window.

Complete the given below instructions to hide notification are icons in Windows 7:

Step 1: Right-click on the Taskbar and select Properties.

Step 2: Under the Notification Area, click the button Customize.

Step 3: Look for the icons and select the Behaviors as “Hide icon and notifications” to hide icon as well as other related notifications. If you like to get the notifications, then select “Show only notifications” and click OK.

Step 4: Repeat the same procedure for all the icons out there and then close the window.

Yep, it’s very annoying. I hope the final/RTM of 7 manages this better.

Anyhow, the only solution to reset/remove old icons from the Notification Area Icons (that actually works) is to do this:

1. Download and install CCleaner 2. Run it; on the main page near the bottom, check the box for “Tray Notification cache” 3. Run Cleaner 4. Close CCleaner 5. End and restart explorer.exe by starting Task Manager (Ctrl-Shift-Esc), right click “explore.exe”, end process and confirm – you’ll lose the task bar but then just goto File – New Task (run) and type “explorer.exe” without the “” and then enter. Done!

When an app is uninstalled shouldn’t those taskbar icons go with it? I have a number of icons listed that belong to programs that I’ve tried with Win 7 but didn’t keep. How do I remove (not hide) them?